April 17, 2025 – Emporia State baseball pours on the offense early and often on Thursday in Tahlequah, taking game one against Northeastern State 18-8 behind 17 hits.
The Hornets quickly jumped on top of the Riverhawks in the first frame, loading the bases with no outs to force a quick pitching change. Emporia State would push across four in the first to build an early lead. Northeastern State grabbed one run off of Hornet starter
Nick Woodcock in the bottom of the half before the Hornets added five more runs in the second.
After an error and a double steal to make the score 6-1, Emporia State got a three-run homer from
Jovanni Toledo, his seventh of the season to build a 9-1 advantage.
In the third, the lead swelled to ten as
Noah Steele and
Cooper Schwindt hit back-to-back homers to make the score 11-1. Northeastern State scored four runs through the middle innings, pulling within 11-5 of the Hornets headed to the seventh frame.
Cooper Schwindt added two RBI to his total in the seventh with a single, making the score 13-5, and after a scoreless bottom half from reliever
Coby Rogers,
Peyton Lewis increased the lead to 14-5 in the eighth with an RBI single, his third hit of the game.
Emporia State added to their total in the ninth, tacking on four more runs, their third inning of the game with four or more runs.
TJ Racherbaumer got the inning started with a double down the right field line for an RBI, the double by Racherbaumer was the 37th of his career, tying Tod Schulz for eighth-most in program history. Following a wild pitch to make the score 16-5, the Hornets got RBI from
Jovanni Toledo and
Elijah Reeves to build an 18-5 advantage.
In the final at-bat for the Riverhawks, the home team was able to scratch across three runs before the Hornets closed out the game for the 18-8 win.
Emporia State's 18 runs matched a season-high, as the Hornets scored 18 runs twice against Maryville earlier this season. The pitching staff struck out 15 batters, matching the most this season.
The Hornets had 17 hits in the game, with five batters tallying multi-hit games.
Jovanni Toledo led the way going 4-5 with five RBI, matching his career-high in hits and setting a new career-high in RBI.
Cooper Schwindt drove in four runs of his own.
Nick Woodcock got his first career start and allowed two runs over 4.0 innings, while also matching his career-high with eight strikeouts. In relief
Brandon Vassalo and
Coby Rogers pitched the final 5.0 innings with Vassalo earning his first career win and Rogers striking out a career-high six batters in 3.1 innings pitched.
The series between Emporia State and Northeastern State will wrap up on Friday, April 18 with a doubleheader beginning at 12:00 p.m.
